JANUARY 25, 2024 BY ANN MCCREARY

WDFW must develop new rules for wolf kills

Inslee’s directive a big win for wildlife groups

Gov. Jay Inslee has directed state wildlife managers to develop new rules governing when endangered gray wolves can be killed in response to attacks on livestock.

The governor sided with a coalition of wildlife conservation groups that called for reforms to state protocols on killing wolves in a petition submitted to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission last fall.

The commission rejected the petition by a 6-3 vote in October. The wildlife groups appealed the decision to Inslee, who directed the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) this month to begin drafting new rules “to put into place enforceable standards to regulate the state’s management of endangered gray wolves.”

The governor’s directive is seen as a win for conservation groups who say too many wolves are being killed by WDFW as a result of conflicts with livestock. Wildlife advocates have been pushing for “greater accountability, transparency and clarity” about decisions on killing wolves, said Claire Loebs Davis, president of Washington Wildlife First, one of the groups that petitioned for the new rules.

Davis called Inslee’s decision “a significant victory, both for Washington’s wolves and for our campaign to ensure that the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife makes management decisions based on the best available science rather than in response to demands by entrenched special interests.”

Ongoing effort

Since 2012, 53 wolves have been killed for “actual or claimed conflicts” and 75% of those killed were as a result of conflict involving a single livestock owner, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the petitioners.

In response to Inslee’s directive, issued on Jan. 12, WDFW said staff would meet with the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission to initiate the rulemaking process.

In a statement, WDFW noted that the petition filed last year is similar to petitions received from conservation groups in 2014, 2020 and 2022, that were all rejected by the wildlife commission. In 2019, Inslee directed WDFW to find ways to reduce the number of wolves being killed by the agency, but conservation groups said WDFW did not significantly change its management approach.

“Third time’s the charm, and I hope that this time the state will listen to the science and adopt rules that will reduce wolf killing and lessen livestock losses,” said Amaroq Weiss of the Center for Biological Diversity.

Melanie Rowland, a Methow Valley resident and member of the state Fish and Wildlife Commission, was one of the three members on the commission who voted to accept the petition from conservation groups last fall and said she welcomes the opportunity to address the ongoing issue.

“The reason for the petition is to assure were doing the least killing of an endangered species that we can do and still have livestock producers not being unduly affected by the wolves that are returning,” Rowland said.

WDFW currently uses a “wolf livestock interaction protocol” to guide how the state responds to wolf depredations on livestock. Rowland said it’s time the agency moves forward on formalizing its management through a legally binding rule developed with public comment.

“I don’t see what the big deal is about a rule,” Rowland said. “Rules are what make government agencies accountable. The public can challenge them, if public thinks they are not implementing a rule correctly. A protocol is guidance for the agency, but there is no public comment required and the agency can deviate from it with no legal consequences,” she said.

“Those of us who support a wolf rule are not saying the agency has violated the protocol or acted irresponsibly, at least in recent years,” Rowland added. “Recently WDFW has done a good job of reducing the number of wolves killed under the protocol for livestock predation.

“But the protocol can easily be changed or ignored under a future administration, while the public can force compliance with a rule through the courts, and a rule must go through the rulemaking process to be changed,” she said.

Rowland sits on the wildlife committee of the Fish and Wildlife Commission, and said she’d like to see the wildlife committee take the lead on putting together a draft rule for public comment.

New policies urged

In a letter explaining his directive to begin rulemaking, Inslee said that while he cannot legally prescribe specific policies, he urged WDFW to “consider new policies or regulations on ‘caught in the act’ procedures, as a number of wolves have recently been killed under ‘caught in the act’ when they were not attacking livestock. If not restricted and carefully monitored, this vague policy may be used to unjustly kill an increasing number of Washington’s wolves.”

In their petition, conservation groups listed a dozen recommendations to improve wolf management, including calling for limits to “caught in the act” provisions that petitioners said provide “a loophole that allows livestock owners to kill wolves without any accountability.”

The petition said that 10 wolves “caught in the act” were shot, with nine of those confirmed killed, between June 2017-May 2023, with five instances in the past 17 months. In seven of the nine killings, incidence reports show the wolves were not attacking when killed, petitioners said.

Other recommendations from the petitioners include prohibiting killing wolves on public land or as a result of predations on livestock grazing on public land; and prohibiting killing wolves due to livestock predations in close proximity to known core wolf areas like dens, or when killing wolves will orphan or jeopardize the survival of pups.

Petitioners also recommended requiring livestock owners to sign damage control prevention agreements before WDFW will use tax money to pay for killing wolves as a result of predation on their livestock; and requiring WDFW to develop conflict mitigation plans for chronic conflict areas.

Some recommendations mirror current protocols, such as requiring three confirmed wolf predations on livestock, at least two of which resulted in the death of livestock, within 30 days before WDFW considers killing wolves.

WDFW said that lethal removal of wolves has dropped by 64% in the past four years. In 2019 WDFW killed nine wolves, three in 2020, two in 2021, six in 2022, and two in 2023.

Since the Lookout Pack was discovered in the Methow Valley in 2008, the first known resident gray wolf pack in the state since the 1930s, the state’s wolf population has grown to at least 216 wolves and 37 packs in 2022, according to WDFW’s most recent count. Wolves were listed by the state as an endangered species in 1980.

Groups involved in the petition to draw up new wolf rules include the Center for Biological Diversity, Washington Wildlife First, Cascadia Wildlands, Western Watersheds Project, WildEarth Guardians, Kettle Range Conservation Group, Northwest Animal Rights Network, Animal Wellness Action/Center for a Humane Economy, Endangered Species Coalition, Coexisting with Cougars in Klickitat County and Predator Defense.